1. In a suit for possession of the disputed land filed by Mohinder Singh and Gurmel Singh respondents 1 and 2 (hereinafter called the plaintiffs) on the basis of a registered sale-deed executed in their favour on June 18, 1968, by the husband of the defendant-petitioner, the defence of the petitioner was that the disputed property had been gifted to her on April 13, 1956, that the gift was oral, was accompanied by possession and that the petitioner had been in continuous possession of the land through her son Madan Jit Singh (respondent No. 3 before me) since April, 1956. After the conclusion of the evidence led by the plaintiffs in the affirmative and of the evidence led by the defendant-petitioner and before the recording of the plaintiffs evidence in rebuttal, an application was made by the petitioner in the trial Court under Order 6, Rule 17 of the Code of Civil Procedure for permission to amend her written statement so as to add an alternative defence to the claim of the plaintiffs about her being not liable to deliver possession to the plaintiffs on the ground that even if she was not able to prove the oral gift, she had become an absolute owner of the property by adv